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How to disable history from about:newtab without disabling the new tab page entirely?

  • 2 replies
  • 7 have this problem
  • 3 views
  • Last reply by cor-el

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Is it possible to make it so that the about:newtab page doesn't show my history/visited pages, and firefox doesn't save thumbnails from those pages, but still let me have pinned pages/bookmarks of my choosing on about:newtab with thumbnails for those pinned pages?


I know I can change "browser.newtab.url" in about:config to "about:blank", but I don't want to disable the new tab page, just not have it show my history + save thumbnails of visited pages.

I also know about adding "browser.pagethumbnails.capturing_disabled with value: true" & "pageThumbs.enabled with value: false" but I assume that'd remove all thumbnails entirely and wouldn't stop about:newtab from showing my history.

I guess I could also fill all of the slots with pinned pages of my choosing, but that wouldn't stop firefox from making thumbnails of my visited pages.

I'd also rather not clear history every time I shut down firefox or use "Never remember history"/"Always use private browsing mode".

Thanks in advance.

Is it possible to make it so that the about:newtab page doesn't show my history/visited pages, and firefox doesn't save thumbnails from those pages, but still let me have pinned pages/bookmarks of my choosing on about:newtab with thumbnails for those pinned pages? I know I can change "browser.newtab.url" in about:config to "about:blank", but I don't want to disable the new tab page, just not have it show my history + save thumbnails of visited pages. I also know about adding "browser.pagethumbnails.capturing_disabled with value: true" & "pageThumbs.enabled with value: false" but I assume that'd remove all thumbnails entirely and wouldn't stop about:newtab from showing my history. I guess I could also fill all of the slots with pinned pages of my choosing, but that wouldn't stop firefox from making thumbnails of my visited pages. I'd also rather not clear history every time I shut down firefox or use "Never remember history"/"Always use private browsing mode". Thanks in advance.

All Replies (2)

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Take look thru this AMO search for an extension which provides the features that you want.

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If you disable thumbnails via the prefs that you mentioned in your above post and pin all tiles with bookmark and history items then you won't see visited websites.

  • name: browser.pagethumbnails.capturing_disabled with value: true
  • name: pageThumbs.enabled with value: false

Delete the thumbnails folder in the Firefox profile folder to remove already stored web page thumbnails.

You can also reduce the number of tiles via these two prefs:

  • browser.newtabpage.columns (3)
  • browser.newtabpage.rows (3)